Monday, May 19, 2008

Kuala Lampur

rory and i went to Kuala Lampur in Malaysia for a weekend getaway. she was flying there for work so i got a cheap flight and a free hotel. :) that city is pretty cool. modern but somehow it felt old. the buildings and monorail, along with other infrastructure seemed water damaged or aged in a way that reminded me of star wars movies and how the spaceships, though futuristic, were dirtied by the (space) elements. anyway, i thought it looked neat.

so we got there and had a nice two hour spa massage. i've never had a proper spa massage, only the cheap china town ones and it was very relaxing. we had a nap and then went out to see the town. the twin petronas towers, like silver darts that shone like heavenly beacons drew us to them and the mall beside. we had some malaysian food at a restaurant in the mall and decided to walk back to the hotel.

on the way back we came across a busy street that was lined with colourful bars. we ducked into a few and had some drinks. the last one we came across, however, was overpopulated with asian girls dressed to impress and old white businessmen. the girls were looking for husbands and/or cash and the guys, well, they were pretty disgusting. we had a good time watching the interactions going on and danced a little before the music stopped and someone grabbed the mic. "this is a police raid, would all foreigners please go to the left of the room and all locals to the right." my first thoughts were 'cool'. but then i quickly realized that rory, being asian, might be perceived differently. they started collecting everyone's passports and we had left ours in the hotel. a few people tried to grab rory but we managed to sneak out of the bar after being locked in for two hours (the bar was still serving though).

outside, the girls were all sitting on the pavement, maybe 150 of them, and as we got out of the bar, two big police trucks came. the girls, all crying and yelling for people to help them were loaded onto the trucks. i grabbed the camera and took the below video. i was nervous to leave rory though for fear she might be grabbed and thrown in also.

we went back to the hotel and the next morning, instead of going shopping, rory was violently ill. we had to catch a flight at 5 pm to go home. i managed to get her out of bed and we went shopping a bit but she wanted to go back. i ended up having to leave her in the hotel because she wasn't fit to fly and because my ticket was bought at a discount, couldn't be changed. she was diagnosed with food poisoning and came home the next day.



despite all the craziness, it was a fun short trip and i want to go back to KL for longer next time.


Here are some pics

3 comments:

James17930 said...

I can see how all these girls looking for foreign husbands might be considered gauche, but how exactly is it illegal? Why were they all arrested?

Jamie said...

i think it was an illegal immigration issue but at the same time, malaysia is a muslim country so they don't have to have a reason.

James17930 said...

Yeah, but they're a democracy and a member of the Commonwealth . . . you would think that would count for something . . .(?)